Leisure and idleness in the Renaissance: the ambivalence of otium

Scholars are ashamed of otium. But there is something noble about leisure and idleness. ‐ If idleness really is the beginning of all vice, then it is at any rate in the closest proximity to all virtue; the idle man is always a better man than the active. ‐ But when I speak of leisure and idleness, you do not think I am alluding to you, do you, you sluggards?‐Nietzsche